Dragon Kiss (Short Story)

A tale inspired by and written for The Ninth Age, a tabletop fantasy war game. For more information on this wondrous hobby please see hither: The Ninth Age

Dragon Kiss/ Morks’ Reign

Cracked and worried wood planks. The well-worn bottom of an upturned stein. A puddle of, what presumably, was stale beer. ‘What time is it?’

‘I’m sure there was something I was supposed to do.’ Came a familiar voice through the din of pounding war drums at the back of the engineer’s thick skull.

Thrully lifted his leaden, throbbing head out of the puddle of Grizzly Badger XXX and gazed blearily around the Common Room of the Giants Head Inn, Grunthemsberg. Wobbly distorted figures got up from adjacent tables and shifted cautiously over to darker corners.

The dwarf blinked and stifled a burning, acidy, frothy, biley burp. A humid and moist quack emanated from below the table.

“I’m sure there was something I was supposed to do today…” he muttered to himself as he tried to focus; a few of his ‘S’s’ contracted then elongated as he fumbled the sentence through cracked, dry lips.

Where was Dragon Kiss? He checked unsteadily about him, his grip firmly on his seat. She wasn’t by his side or fallen under the table. Gone. And why wasn’t his humble axe not even at this belt? He repositioned his goggles on his forhead then rubbed the back of his head massaging it through his leather cap. Even this felt odd, as if it didn’t fit him anymore. Where were his friends? Where was his shirt! He hadn’t drunk alone in decades. And certainly hadn’t had a hangover of this magnitude in even longer. Could he be…still drunk? Surely not, dwarfs can drink solidly for a whole weekend then still get up first thing on a Mournday morning and pull a pit wagon out of a mine shaft.

A human in a filthy apron appeared and began mopping at the flood plains of Thrullys’ table.

‘Where Dragon Kiss?’ Thrully blurted, realising only moments afterward that it was he who had spoken.

The rippling, distorted lines on the stout yeoman’s’ face shifted; what was probably an eye brow lifted slowly.

‘Behind the bar’ said the man, his voice coarse but not without an underlying note of compassion. However, with meaning he righted the upturned stein and carefully and deliberately removed it from Thrullys’ now empty table.

The dwarf rolled back in his chair. His mouth opened and his jaw sank. Moisture sprang up under his eye lids. His heirloom, his prized hand gun that his fathers’ fathers’ father hand built whilst besieged by vile Ratmen in Mount Bottkrak. So intricate and so well-crafted was it that it was priceless and could never be replicated or sold at any price. Or so he thought. What could have possessed him? What manner of sorcery was this? That gun was his life, his heritage, his birth right! Him! And generations before him! His mentorship, his teaching.

His addled mind scrambled for answers and his heart sped up. He immediately thought about ordering a flagon to help calm his nerves and clear his mind. But for some reason he presupposed that on rifling through his pockets he’d only find them bare, which affronted his proud nature. But wait, he wasn’t a beggar, why was he thinking like this? You don’t become a street denizen after a mere night of revelry. Even if it was Grizzly Badger he’d been drinking.

His whiskery brow furrowed as he closed his eyes tight and gripped the table edge in an effort to recall at least something. After a moment or two of intense concentration he remembered…beer.

Then he remembered…more beer.

He remembered…an explosion. Several explosions. And not the good kind; not the kind that reveals gold after the smoke and debris had cleared. He concentrated on remembering even harder and…a flash of green! And corroded armour! And Greenskins! They’re never the good kind. Well, the only good kind are the kind that are not there after a good explosion and all the smoke and debris had cleared.

Rain. What was it about rain? Rain doesn’t worry dwarves. Rain doesn’t worry Greenskins. Why rain? Instinctively he leant forward and rest his head on his meaty, intensive-labour-chiselled fist and outstretched his other hand for a stein. Hopeless, despairingly, he withdrew his shaking hand, clenched it into the tightest rocky, knuckled ball then fell back against the robust chair. He spent the next few minutes staring, caught up in his strained thoughts trying to recollect.

A great weight seemed to be laying him low. He was a stout warrior of many campaigns, the hardest working of craftsmen and above all a dwarf. He had been Master Engineer of King Ulthred the Feareds’ Throng for decades. Even thousands of leagues under the mountains he had never felt so…compressed! As if he was carrying a tribe of giants on his back.

The barmen must have noticed his anxiety and plonked a foamy headed stein of ale in front of him. Thrulleys’ first reaction was of repulsion and nausea as his head reared away from it.

‘S’ on the house, Venger. But after that you’re going to have to move on,’ again, that same surly tone, although with a lukewarm hint of morale fibre lubricating each syllable. Consideration to his plight?

The dwarf tried to focus on the mans’ earnest eyes. Failing, he slumped back then reached for the beer all the same. If he could he would have asked the man why he pitied him. Unaccustomed to human generosity and their mannerisms the words to express this felled his tongue short.

He sipped. Vomit and stomach acid immediately leapt up his throat as soon as the liquid hit the back of his tongue. But he wrestled down the biliousness and felt the rich ale sploshing down through his empty stomach. The familiar taste and warming sensation took a mere moment to jolt his misty mind-The rain. The rain had been…green!

Memories came flooding back too fast for him to grasp what they were signifying or to put them in to any logical well maintained order. Wave after wave of familiar images assaulted him.

Dead. Hundreds of fierce, loyal, hardy dwarf veterans, dead. Comrades. Drinking partners. Butchered. The centre of the dwarf line smashed by wild, rampaging, Neanderthal orcs. The mighty war banner of Ulthred, held high and proud by Thane Guthri The Epic, trampled into the stained earth by blood mad barbarians. The left flank ridiculed and humiliated by filthy gobbos on spiders and insane greenskin contraptions of death.

The Great Cannon misfired continuously even with the powerful runes of artificers plastered all over it. His own Marksmen and the Grudge Thrower fared little better, plagued by freak mishaps or else payloads wildly off target. Ammo sailing through the green skies battered by freak winds and rain. The Wardens didn’t get more than a handful of shots off at skirmishing spider riders before being overrun by stinking trolls.

Thrullys’ head rolled away from his chest, his welling eyes tried to focus on the ceiling. The anguished roar of an outraged dragon cut through the commotion in his head and mercilessly slew the silence pervading the bar room. Very few Umgi have ever seen a dwarf cry. Or for that matter howl in such a disturbed manner.

The only sounds thereafter were the scraping of tables, chairs and the patter of boots beating a hasty retreat to the tavern door.

‘I should have died…’ Sobbed Thrully to the silence in general. I should have been holding the line with my comrades’. His teeth gnashed as he spat wretched curses; ‘…rather than trying to oust green filth from supplies already ruined and contaminated. Brethren died because of my folly’. Tears streamed down his cheek and beard. Saliva jettisoned from his curled lips as he shook with revulsion and torment.

The tavern door burst open almost losing its hinges. A shaft of brilliant mid-morning sun cut deep into the gloomy interior. A Gromril encased dwarf, broader than the doorway, confidently crab walked in. From behind his gigantic shield and helmet visor he scanned the barroom. Satisfied he crab walked back out into the street. A young Runic Smith in the livery of King Ulthred and bearing a long handled Rune Hammer of office then appeared defiantly and aloof in the doorway. This newcomer seamed shocked to see the place deserted. He spied the landlord peering at him from a doorway behind the bar. The young dwarf gave him a quizzical raised eye brow.

The proprietor gave a slight nod toward the inebriate dwarf in the corner then slowly and gravely shook his head before disappearing into the back rooms. The newcomer peered through the gloom and his gaze finally rested on the sombre, hunched form of Thrully.

‘Brother Thrully, thank Drunti. I’ve been searching for you everywhere.’

Not a muscle moved in the silence. The Runic Smith, arms outstretched in customary greeting, advanced toward him.

‘I doubt I would ever have found you were it not for that colossal howl just now!…’

More dumbfounding silence.

The Smiths brow furrowed and he adopted a harder edged demeanour, ‘Ahem! I have a summons from King Ulthred the Feared. You are to report to him immediately.’

The engineer didn’t stir. He merely continued to outstare his beer. Knuckles white around the stein. The Runic Smith became impatient at this impertinent display of disrespect.

‘Master Thrully, can you hear me? I said…’

‘I am no engineer, Beardling’. Spat the older dwarf coldly with venom and spite. ‘I can barely be considered a dwarf.’ Fresh tears welled in his eyes.

The Runic Smith, not used to being addressed this way, took a moment to rally. His tone softened somewhat ‘All the same, I think you should come pretty sharpish…’

Cumbersomely and laboriously Thrully reached up and dragged the leather cap and goggles off his head. The Runic Smith gasped.

Rather than a full head of grey white, semi platted locks there was a rough, freshly shorn, white scalp and flash of white-grey Mohawk. A demented gaze met the Smiths’. The dead, stone-cold glare caught the newcomer off guard and he took a faltering step back. Thrullys’ fists clenched and he scowled, ‘I no longer answer to any king, boy. I have taken the oath.’

‘Thrully,’ Said the younger dwarf, almost in a whisper, ‘the massacre at the crossroads was all of our undoing, not merely yours to bear alone’.

‘My presence could have shifted the tide. I faltered in my duty to my king and my throng. My…kin…’

‘We all did what we could in the face of elements beyond our control or wisdom. The powers of the Dark Ones were aligned against us. Have you seen the lesser moon ever shine so, so…green?’

‘I was aware. It matters not. I should have fallen with my crew or my Marksmen. Not swatting lesser Greenskins in my trailer.’

‘But surely…master engineer, you have not atoned to myself nor at the alter of Grimmite. Proper procedures have not been addressed. What of your station, what of the Throng? What of Dragon Kiss?’

‘I am no longer permitted to use my beloved Dragon Kiss.’ He motioned toward the landlord who was spying again from the reasonable safety of the bar. ‘But keep her well!’ He hollered at the man. ‘I shall return for her in this life or the next.’

Without even turning, nor a second thought, the Smith whipped a heavy purse from his belt and threw it sideways at length towards the bar. The crunch and subsequent tinkling suggested the purse had burst showering the bar top with gold. The subsequent scrabbling, scuffing and clinking suggested the barman was gathering up all he could find.

‘This is to be your path then?’ asked the newcomer solemnly. ‘I cannot plead with you to judge yourself fairly at my alter?’

‘The Greenskins made my choice for me before the throng even took to the field’.

The landlord cautiously sidled up to the Runic Smith, his laden arms outstretched.

‘I shall inform the king,’ sighed the Smith relieving the barmen of his burden and shouldering the glistening heirloom. ‘Grimmite bless your tred, Brother Thrully. And may He bear your doom directly.’

‘Aye, Bretheren. I hope he does.’

The Runesmith stopped at the tavern door, light splashing off his ornamental robes. He took one last look around the room then said in a low voice, ‘It may interest you to learn that our Lord intends to meet the Greenskin filth at Hardbough Woods. He cannot hope to defeat the entire orc tribe but moves to hold it long enough for a reprieve. Human reinforcements from this very town are even now moving to outflank our foe. Perhaps your doom is not so far away after all.’

The Runesmith departed to a chorus of clinking fine-wrought armour marching back down the street.

Thrully focused on the tin stein in his hand. It groaned slightly then crumpled in his fist. The slayer stood up fast knocking the table over and away from him. ‘You got a weapon around here human?’ He roared toward the bar. The Landlord peered over the top. The wide eyed man disappeared into the back then came hastily round the side of the bar with Thrullys’ hand axe. It was a simple, light weight, short-handled affair but dwarf made, keen and hardy. The terrified man passed it to him reverently with both hands.

‘It’s yours, take it. Just don’t come back. Please.’

The dwarf took the familiar weapon, gave a half nod to the barkeep then lurched toward the door. The blazing sun bathed him in warm light stinging his eyes. He steadied himself on the door frame then looked over his shoulder with a sneer.

‘Don’t worry,’ said Thrully. ‘No-one can be that unlucky. Not even me’.

…And so here ends the tragic tale and life of Engineer Thrully Fusebeard. But so too begins the story of Fusebeard the Orc Slayer…To be continued.